Girls Tank Battle

Genre: 2-Stick Shooter / Roguelike

Players: 1

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Review:

Girls Tank Battle is a 2-Stick Shooter with Roguelike mechanics released on Nintendo Switch in 2021, where players control a tank in an enclosed arena, shooting squares bouncing off the sides of the arena while trying not to collide with them, with bigger squares breaking apart into smaller squares in a way that is strongly reminiscent of the classic arcade game Asteroids.

The anime-style “girls” in the game’s title are static images that are exclusively in menus and results screens, and seem to be purely there for decoration, as the game has no named characters or story. I should note that a few of these images are somewhat racy, such as one with a transparent wet shirt, though none of these images contain actual nudity. In other words, it’s just enough to make players embarrassed if anyone watches you playing the game.

Beyond these images, the game’s visuals are largely blocky “voxel”-style 3D visuals that are in absolutely no way impressive, but work well enough for the gameplay, backed by repetitive synthesized electronica music that works well enough for the game’s action but isn’t distinct or memorable. Oddly, despite how unimpressive this all is, the game has a rather long load time when you first start it, though thankfully this isn’t an issue after the game does eventually load.

Given the earlier description, you could be forgiven for thinking Girls Tank Battle is going to be a terrible game enticing players in with sex appeal in place of good gameplay. However, against all odds, this is pretty fun, actually.

The game is played in rounds, with each round preceded by selecting one of three randomly-chosen upgrades for your tank, much in the same way you see in games like Vampire Survivors. I do wish there were a greater variety of these upgrades, and that they were more creative, but even with what’s here you’ll still have some fun options like placing turrets, being surrounded by drones, or upgrading your shots to be greater in number, more powerful, or splitting into additional shots when they hit enemies.

In-between runs, you’ll be able to purchase permanent upgrades via three different kinds of in-game currency (though there aren’t microtransactions here) – one allows players to buy stat increases to health, power, and an income multiplier; one allows the purchase of additional helper tanks to follow you, and one allows you to purchase a random permanent bonus. Again, I would like to have seen this expanded upon even further, but what’s here still makes for some compelling game progression.

I suppose my main complaint here would be that your “enemies”, such as they are, are pretty uninspired. Mostly you’ll be fighting mindless cubes that endlessly slide around bouncing off the sides of the arena, though you do have boss battles against… well, bigger cubes, with these enemies attacking with extremely simple patterns, either charging you or sending more cubes out at you. Mainly the way the game scales up the challenge as you progress is by filling the arena with more cubes, bigger ones, and ones that have more health. Pretty uninspired.

However, even with these complaints, Girls Tank Battle is still a surprisingly enjoyable 2-Stick Shooter, especially when you start to stack up power-ups and fill the arena with your gunfire. The enemy AI is nearly nonexistent, the gameplay is fairly simple, the presentation is unimpressive, and the “girls” of the game’s title do little but add unnecessary pandering… but it works. Go figure.

tl;dr – Girls Tank Battle is a 2-Stick Shooter and Roguelike where players shoot cubes using a tank… oh, and also there are girls in the menu screens. This game is extremely simple, has an unimpressive presentation, and the enemy AI is nearly nonexistent. Yet despite these flaws, the gameplay is still really satisfying, stacking power-ups to make your tank into a force to be reckoned with. If you’re looking for simple, fun action, you might want to give this game a look.

Grade: B-

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